The present invention relates to an apparatus for obtaining and electronically interpreting closely-focused digital images of liquids, solids and combinations of liquids and solids (which are hereinafter referred to individually as “substance” or collectively as “substances”) being subjected to controlled quantities and qualities of light shining through and over such substance. More particularly, but not exclusively, one detailed described embodiment of the present invention set forth herein and referred to as a container-receiving embodiment relates to obtaining and electronically interpreting closely-focused digital images of wine in a sealed wine bottle or blood in a test tube. In addition, another detailed described embodiment of the present invention set forth herein and referred to as a handheld embodiment relates to obtaining and electronically interpreting digital images of substances in open containers, pools and piles or blood in capillaries.
The relative quality of many liquid, solid and combination of liquid and solid substances can be interpreted from various optical characteristics of those substances. Various optical arrangements are known for measuring and analyzing the various optical characteristics of test samples, such as spectrophotometers. The prior art devices, however, are typically bulky, expensive, require a high degree of operator skill and expertise, and usually require opening the container of substance and placing a sample of the substance being assayed into a carrier that is then further processed, placed in the testing apparatus and tested. The present invention is designed to simply and economically capture a closely focused digital image of a substance while the substance is being subjected to a controlled light at various times during the manufacturing, transportation, sales, use and consumption cycle.
One use of the present invention is to obtain and store closely focused digital images of a substance at various stages of the manufacturing, transportation, sales, use and consumption cycle. By comparing the closely focused digital images obtained at the optimal stage of the manufacturing or packaging process and comparing the baseline digital images with subsequent digital images, one can detect differences in the digital images that indicate differences in the quality of the substance. In addition, one can program the electronic component of the present invention to ascertain and store distinct optical characteristics of a particular substance in a data table that correlates those distinct optical characteristics with other subjective sensory and other otherwise objectively measurable qualities of the substance in order to develop a correlative database that may be used to predict the “quality” of the substance based upon its distinct optical characteristics.
Many substances that are manufactured and sold in sealed transparent or translucent containers will degrade if the container and the substance contained therein are not properly cared for. Most of the prior art devices for testing whether the quality of a particular substance has been maintained require opening sealed containers of the substance for sampling and testing. For example, a consumer who wants to assess the quality of wine contained in a sealed bottle cannot presently do so without opening the bottle, which exposes the liquid contained therein to air containing both oxygen and aerobic bacteria, either one or both of which will promptly begin to act to degrade the wine. In addition, the need often arises to test the quality of substances contained in large bulk containers, vats, or natural land surface pools or piles in situations where obtaining a sample for use in a remote prior art device or transporting an unwieldy prior art device to the substance to be assayed is unfeasible. Finally, the prior art devices usually assay distinct optical characteristics, such as absorption of various light spectra or the presence of particular substances, which assays usually are performed using means requiring expensive equipment or expensive reagents. An economical alternative to the prior art testing means is to obtain a closely-focused digital image of a specific substance known to be in an “optimal” condition, interpreting that digital image and maintaining a database of such closely-focused digital images for comparison with subsequent digital images of the same substance obtained at later stages of sales and delivery cycle and prior to consumption in order to assure the continued quality of the substance.
There is thus a widely recognized need for, and it would be highly advantageous to have, an apparatus that would allow for obtaining and electronically interpreting the closely focused digital images of substances contained in sealed transparent containers, including but not limited to bottles of wine, without having to break the seal on such containers. In addition, there is also a widely recognized need for an economical and highly portable apparatus that can be used for obtaining and electronically interpreting the digital images of substances contained in large bulk liquid containers, vats, and open pools and piles. Finally, there is also a widely recognized need for a quality assurance mechanism for testing the optical characteristics of substances economically by obtaining and interpreting their digital images instead of other optical characteristics using prior art devices.
The aim of the present invention is to provide an improved apparatus which overcomes or substantially reduces at least some of the drawbacks and limitations of the prior art by allowing for obtaining and electronically interpreting a closely focused digital image of a substance at the time that the substance is being subjected to controlled qualities and quantities of light shining through and over the substance. The preferred embodiments of the present invention are capable of obtaining and interpreting such closely-focused digital images of substances contained in transparent containers, large bulk containers, vats and open pools or piles without having to open the containers or remove discrete samples of the fluids and solids being assayed.